Sahashi Minato
Sahashi Minato (佐橋 皆人) also known as the Ashikabi of the North, is the main protagonist of the story. He is a 19 year old average teenager who happens to be highly intelligent, yet due to his inability to resist pressure has failed his entrance exam twice, and as result has been branded an idiot and loser. Minato's known family consists of his mother Sahashi Takami, his unknown grandmother, and his younger sister Yukari; his father is unknown but it's been hinted, that Minaka might be Minato's biological father. Minato became an Ashikabi after being swept up in a battle between Sekireis and is currently the most powerful Ashikabi in the North sector of the city. His sister is also an Ashikabi although Minato is not yet aware of this. His mother happens to work in MBI and knows about the Sekirei Plan and is actually in charge of it. His first Sekirei was Musubi, who wished for him to be her Ashikabi for his kindness. He has since then winged five more Sekireis. He is also a target of MBI because he helped No. 95 Kuno and her Ashikabi Haruka Shigi escape the city to live peacefully. Appearance During the entire story, Minato is a short and slim young man with black hair, almost always wearing a white shirt and blue jeans. There are occasions when he wears a blue jacket over his white shirt but that happens only when he heads out together with his Sekirei. Minato also seems to have a likeable appearance in the Sekirei universe as according to Homura, Minato has the facial expressions and gesture of a good person.Sekirei Manga chapter 55 Minatofirstappearence.jpg|Minato's first appearence Minatoutsideoutfit.jpg|Minato wearing his blue jacket over his white shirt. Personality Minato is highly intelligent, capable of devising ways on how to make better use of Sekirei abilities and is able to execute strategies in order to beat the opponent in Sekirei battles.Sekirei Manga chapter 87Sekirei Manga chapter 88 Despite his capabilities, Minato is an insecure invidual in the beginning who has a passive personality and often lacks the confidence to go against his own Sekirei when they decide on something. Examples are: *When he ordered Musubi and Tsukiumi to avoid the dangerous roaming veiled Sekirei (actually Uzume), he immediatly received the opposite reaction and wasn't able to convince them to stay home instead of going after the mysterious Sekirei. *Another good example is Tsukiumi refusing Minato's request to participate in the escape plan to help Kuno and Haruka Shigi escape from the capital or Homura who decides that he should be the one to hold on Matsu's stolen jinki for the time being without asking for Minato's permission. Minato's mother seems to be the cause of his personality, as it's several times times stated that Minato never had the guts to go against his mother or sister, which the latter is a complete opposite of his personality.Sekirei Manga chapter 06 Minato also has a caring and emotional side to him. Unlike many Ashikabi's, he often worries about the fights where his Sekirei get involved and shows the utmost care and respect for his Sekirei. He also never gets angry with his Sekirei and tries to convince them that despite his insecurities, he would fight with them and face his fear for his Sekireis sake. That said, he has expressed several times the desire that even though he participates in these fights, he rather would want to defeat the enemy Sekirei without the use of aggresive violence because he wants to avoid hurting people in the process. His love and kindness for his Sekirei slowly develops Minato's personality throughout the story into a one more befitting a man, even going as far to go against his own mother in a attempt to protect his Sekirei.Sekirei Manga chapter 52 Minato is not afraid to show his feelings for his Sekirei, to the point that he fell in a emotional state and cried when he witnessed Musubi's crest disappearing during the first fight against the Disciplinary Squad, showing that he truly cares for his Sekirei which also earned him Kazehana's admiration and feelings towards him. Abilities and Sekirei As an Ashikabi, Minato has the ability to allow his Sekirei to gain temporarily a power boost after trading a kiss with them. In the series, the power of an Ashikabi can be determined not only by the number of the Sekirei he or she has in his or her disposal, but by the bond between them which marks Minato as an powerful Ashikabi because of his loyalty towards his Sekirei. Sekirei Before the beginning of the third stage, Minato winged a total of six Sekireis. All 6 reacted to him (four of them are "Single Numbers") - three at the game's first stage: Musubi, Kusano and Matsu (her winging was end of the first stage), and three at the second stage: Tsukiumi, Kazehana and Homura (he was the last unwinged Sekirei and his winging was the final phase of the second stage). In the anime, Tsukiumi was winged at the first stage and her winging was end of the first stage. Having quite a handful of strong Sekireis on his side earned him recognition as the strongest Ashikabi in the northern part of the city, as well as the title "Ashikabi of the North" (sometimes referred as "Minato of the North"), though most seem to neglect adding his name due to the fact that he was described as an Ashikabi with "shady" backgrounds. Many believe he is the key to foil the MBI's plans for the Sekirei. No. 88 Musubi The first sekirei that Minato wings. She is a fighter type of sekirei who uses her fists as her weapons. She is sort of slow and does not have a lot of the common sense that regular people would have. One example of this is how she isn't embarrassed to be seen naked. When she is jealous or angry she is often seen with the image of a bear behind her. She cares about Minato a lot, and she wanted to become his sekirei because he was a kind person. She has an alternate personality who has only surfaced a few times so far in the series. This alternate personality is the No. 08 sekirei, Yume who was the second generation disciplinary squad leader. No. 108 Kusano Known as the "Green Girl", Kusano is the second sekirei of Minato Sahashi. She is a young child and has the power of nature, using plants to fight. She does not fight and has stepped in more than once to stop one. She considers No. 107 Shiina to be her brother and was uncomfortable being away from him because without his power of decay, she thought that her powers would go out of control. No. 2 Matsu Matsu is Minato's third sekirei. She is not a fighter and primarily stays in her room at Izumo Inn. Her powers allow her to see through the eyes of electronics. She also happens to be a top class hacker. She stole one of the eight treasures (Jinki) from MBI and is currently in hiding. Although she has stayed in the inn for a long time now, she has stated that soon, even she will have to participate in the fight. No. 9 Tsukiumi Minato's fourth Sekirei. She is a single number Sekirei, which implies that she is very powerful and uses the element water in order to defeat her opponents. She considered Homura to be her rival and despised the idea of having an ashikabi before meeting Minato. After meeting him, however, she began to like the idea and even goes so far as to call herself Minato's wife. Tsukiumi and Musubi often compete over Minato, such as who can sit next to him at dinner. However she cares about Musubi and the other sekireis and follows the rules that the sekireis have amongst themselves. No. 3 Kazehana Minato's fifth sekirei. Kazehana was one of the original Disciplinary squad. After the director of MBI rejected her confession to him, Kazehana left the disciplinary squad to travel the country. She firsts appears in a battle between Tsukiumi and Uzume. She thinks of herself as an older sister to the other sekireis and is very carefree. Her power is wind and she can control wind and air freely. The only people she answers to are No. 1 Miya, the director, and Minato. She is also a friend of Uzume and seeks her out when Minato and the Ashikabi of the South fight over No. 6 Kagari. She tries to convince her to stay and when she realizes that Uzume can't be convinced, she decides to fight her seriously. No. 6 Kagari/Homura Minato's sixth sekirei. Kagari is a unique sekirei. Kagari's gender is actually decided by what the ashikabi wants. Kagari thinks of herself/himself as a guardian of sekirei and defended any sekirei without an ashikabi. Kagari is the last sekirei to be winged in the fight. Because of this, the director incites a huge battle over who gets to wing him/her. Kagari's power is the power of fire. Kagari can control and create fire, creating moves such as Enryu (fire dragon) or Fire wall. When combined with Tsukiumi's water attacks, these fire attacks become powerful steam based attacks. Kagari is not as possesive of Minato as the others and even finds it embaressing. He/She also finds that it is weird to react to Minato because he/she was originally male at the start of the series. However, as time progresses, Kagari begins to turn into a female as he/she reacts to Minato. History Not much is known about Minato's past, except that Matsu states that he originally is a native from Wakayama and was raised by a typical family. He had top scores from elementary to high school.Sekirei Manga chapter 06 We also get to know from Yukari, that Minato would always help her out in the past when she would get lost in dark places like a forest, even though he as child feared those places himself. He would often carry her out of the forest on his back.Sekirei Manga chapter 26 'Synopsis' A student named Minato, appears in the Tokyo capital after informing his mother on the phone about the results of his exam. He enters a train and thinks about the way he has been leading his life, with no close friends and having failed the exam for the second time, he deems himself as a failure. He notices the main building of the company MBI which is a high skyscraper and remarks that MBI was founded by a child prodigy. After leaving the train, he questions himself whether if would manage to get a decent girlfriend while walking home and suddenly feels the ground shaking. He looks around him and notices a girl falling from the sky who screams to get out of her way. The girl who fell on top of him was being attacked by two other Sekireis who seem to generate electricity. Frightened, he questions if he truly witnessed a lightning attack but is dragged off by the girl before receiving any answers. After being dragged off by a far distance, the girl apologizes to Minato for involving him and introduces herself as Musubi. Minato seems to be attracted to Musubi but starts to wonder about what exactly happened and who those people were. Suddenly, Musubi collapses from exhaustion and Minato takes her to his appartment where he treats her hamburgers in order to make her regain energy. While Musubi was expressing her gratitude to Minato and wishes that she would like to have a kind Ashikabi like Minato, her body suddenly reacts with his and she kissed him, which allowed her to activate her powers in the process. Right after this event, he receives a phone call from a unknown professor who explains him that he has entered the Sekirei Plan. Also as a consequence of their meeting, Minato discovers through his conversation with this professor that Musubi is a 'Sekirei' and he is her 'Ashikabi', a human with special genes that allows them to activate a Sekirei's powers in a process called "winging". Currently, he'll be forced to fight and fight other Sekireis until they remain the last people standing on the battlefield and those who succeed will allowed to ascend. The professor also explains him that after becoming an Ashikabi, Minato is forbidden to leak out information about the Sekirei Plan with risk of retaliation by the MBI. Minato who suddenly realizes that he's talking with the CEO of MBI, falls in panic and the professor says farewell to the two. Musubi tries to calm him and Minato comes to the conclusion that he'll stay a while in the capital with Musubi, fearing that something might happen if he would return home. When Minato wakes up the next day, he finds Musubi next to him and is shocked but recalls what happened the day before. After the phone call from the professor, Musubi explained that she didn't have any place to return to and that each Sekirei has to be forever on her Ashikabi's side. He realized that he really went through all the past events and didn't dream. While thinking what he should do next, Musubi starts to change in front of him and he quickly leaves his appartment. After Musubi is finished with changing, Minato asks her why he was chosen as her Ashikabi but she responds that he wasn't chosen, rather he was pulled into it although she doesn't know the details herself. In order to explain a bit more about the reaction of the Sekirei towards their Ashikabi, she kisses him and shows Minato her wings of light. Minato's heart starts to beat faster and he stares in her eyes but Musubi once again collapses from a empty stomach and he takes her to a restaurant where he treats her food. After the meal, Minato suggests to go to a supermarket in order to buy some ingredients but wonders if he has enough money and tells Musubi to go on ahead while he visits the bank. While walking towards the bank, he suddenly gets an phone call and it appears to be his younger sister Yukari who heard about him failing his exams for a second time. Minato uses the opportunity and asks his younger sister Yukari about sending him some female clothing. Yukari misunderstands him and calls him a pervert but eventually agrees to do so. Anime and Manga differences *In the Manga, Musubi gets winged by Minato in his appartment right after he treats her some hamburgers. In the anime, it happens on the street while getting attacked by the thunder twins Hibiki and Hikari. *In the Manga, Minato meets up with Homura for the first time during a walk with Yasaka. This part is not included in the anime. References Category:Ashikabi Category:Izumo Inn